Running Red (Stand Alone Tales Book 7) Read online

  The Red Prince has escaped his home world and his arranged marriage. The Little Wolf has been dispatched to bring him home... intact enough for his bride.

  When the queen announced that her son was going to be wed in ten days, Solari felt nothing. When it was noticed that he had escaped, she felt nothing. When she was assigned to chase after him, she was irritated.

  With her beast locked in her body by a subduing tether, Solari has lived the last ten years half alive as a member of the queen’s wolves. Heading into space is the last place she wants to be, but she knows where Prince Hazwell is going, there is only one place to start a journey in the area. He is heading toward his grandmother’s house... or space station.

  Hazwell has never considered a married life where Solari wasn’t in the picture, but she was made into one of his mother’s guards, and they were not up for grabs. The announcement of his engagement had come as a shock, and his crimson guards spirited him away to his grandmother’s space station where he could get a long-range ship and figure out what he wanted to do next. The trouble was that his grandmother did nothing for free, and his performance in the arena is a requirement for his acquisition of the ship.

  When the Little Wolf also enters the arena, all bets are on.

  The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Running Red

  Copyright © 2020 by Viola Grace

  ISBN: 978-1-989892-19-0

  ©Cover art by Angela Waters

  All rights reserved. With the exception of review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, is forbidden without the express permission of the publisher.

  Running Red

  Published by Viola Grace

  Look for me online at violagrace.com and your favourite eBook sellers.

  Running Red

  Stand-Alone Tales Book 7

  By

  Viola Grace

  Chapter One

  The queen swept through the halls of the palace with her entourage. Her wolf warriors were silent and watchful as they moved behind her in a protective wave.

  She walked up to the practice yard where her son and his red guard were taking turns punching each other.

  “My dear boy. I need a moment of your full attention.”

  Prince Hazwell flipped the man he was grappling with and then walked to his mother, going down on one knee. “Yes, Mother?”

  “I have chosen a bride for you. She will be here in ten days. Try and be presentable.” Queen Laridel smiled and looked at his now-tense form.

  “Mother, who is this woman?” He remained kneeling.

  “She is a solid alliance candidate. When you wed her, we will have a link that will secure our safety.”

  He looked up. “Have we been challenged?”

  “No, child. Of course not, and we won’t be as long as you wed this young lady.”

  He grumbled. “I don’t wish to wed a woman sight unseen.”

  The queen made a humming noise, and the guard went on the alert. “Well, will you give in if you can’t beat one of my guards? She will act as my champion.”

  He looked at the guards and nodded. “Fine. I will fight one of your guards, and if I win, you put the wedding plans on hold.”

  “Agreed. Solari, please take my son to school.”

  Groaning silently, she stepped forward and removed the pelt that she had earned years earlier. She bowed slightly. “Your Highness.”

  He grinned and gestured for her to join him in the center of the space. The other men stepped aside and formed a ring. “So formal? You used to call me Haz.”

  “I also used to be three feet tall.” She felt the wolf under her skin rising. “Shall we?”

  He didn’t reply, but he tried to grab her and lift her. It was his only chance of getting an advantage.

  In the fifteen years since they had met, he had grown considerably and was now close to double her weight with a neck thicker than her thigh and arm put together. She was going to put up a good fight, but this wasn’t one she could win.

  She took two steps back and then dove between his legs, coming up behind him and wrapping him in a headlock. She muttered, “Why are you so fucking slow today?”

  She pulled back, but he swung, and since she wasn’t on her feet, she slowly shifted around until she was hanging in front of him, precisely where she didn’t want to be. He put his hands on her waist, and she pulled up her knees, pressing her feet against his chest and kicking out and back. He fell back, and she flipped him over, pulling his arms up and pinning them high.

  The queen applauded. “Well done, Little Wolf. It wasn’t ideal, but it seems my son loses his fight around you.”

  Solari let him go and backed up several steps, bowing. “My queen, the prince is off his game today. It is not a fair fight.”

  Hazwell was doing a push-up in the sand, and he glanced at her in surprise. “That is kind of you to say, but a win is a win.”

  Solari straightened. “No. Not always.”

  He bowed to his mother. “I will meet with the bride.”

  The queen beamed. “Excellent. Ladies, we have a wedding to plan.”

  Solari bowed to the prince again, took her fur from Harpin, and closed the clasp as she resumed her place behind and to the right of the queen. It was the spot she had been in for the last four years. Since the king had passed.

  “Solari, why did you say that Hazwell was off?” The queen was reading a treatise at her desk.

  “He has far outstripped my skill, my queen. He should have snapped me in half after the first lunge.” She remained at the queen’s right side and shrugged.

  “You should have more faith in your abilities.”

  “I do. I also know what I can’t do, my queen. If I defeated your son today, it is because he wanted me to.”

  “So, you think he wants this marriage?” She twirled her pen in her fingers.

  Solari said calmly, “It is not up to me to know what the prince wants. If you wish for an answer, you will have to ask him.”

  “You two used to be such good friends.”

  “Yes, my queen, that was before I entered your household.”

  The queen chuckled. “Ah, yes. The protocol. You are very precise about it, aren’t you?”

  “My mother was specific that I not rise above my place. She said she had done it once, and it had cost her.”

  “Ah, yes. I had forgotten. You also listened to your mother.” She smiled. “My son could have learned a lot from you.”

  “I am no judge of what his highness does or doesn’t do.”

  The queen sat back and sighed. “You are no fun anymore.”

  Solari nodded. “Yes, my queen. I hear that a lot.”

  The queen sighed again and got back to her work.

  It took less than two hours before Altha ran in and bowed low. “Your Majesty, I have news.”

  The queen had been reading a romance with her feet up on the desk. “What?”

  “The prince.”

  The queen got to her feet. “What? Is he hurt?”

  Altha blurted out, “He’s escaped!”

  Solari was startled into laughing. The queen looked at her with narrowed eyes. “Solari, go and get him.”

  Altha bowed again. “He has sabotaged all the shuttles. The technicians say it will be days before they can take off.”

  “Solari, you have studied interstellar engine mechanics. Go help them.”

  Solari blinked. “I studied for two years, my queen. I am sure that the tec
hs are better at it than I am.”

  “Go. I don’t want to see your moping face around here until you have my son in custody. Take what you need. Bring him home.”

  Solari blinked. “What I need?”

  “Yes. Anything from the armoury or the royal fleet is yours.”

  Solari nodded and walked off. She paced calmly through the halls, and when she was out of the palace, she broke into a light jog. She already had her preferred weapons on her, so there was nothing to do except hang out at the port until a shuttle was fixed.

  She was approaching the port when a member of the red guard stepped into her path. She snapped out her batons and jumped, bringing them down with her body weight. He grunted and dropped to one side.

  She kept the batons out and kept running. The port gates opened to her, and she was attacked inside. She used her batons until necessity made her pop her claws. It was the only part of her beast that she could manifest.

  Solari got to the shuttles, and half were missing. The other half had open hatches and a lot of exposed wiring. “Oh, for fuck’s sake.”

  She whistled sharply, and a mechanic stuck his head out of one of the shuttles. “Which one has the least amount of damage?”

  He blinked. “The one they didn’t get to. It’s old but intact.”

  “Will it fly?”

  “It will fly, but the systems have a problem navigating the jump portals, and that is where you are heading, isn’t it?”

  “Apparently. I need to do some scans.”

  “The scanners are functioning in the second from the left, calculations are in the fourth, and a decent power system for a jump is in the one I am working on. You are the one they call Little Wolf, right?”

  She snarled. “Only the Red Guard call me that. Usually, it is right before their nose explodes with blood.”

  The mechanic held his hands up. “Right, miss. I will stay out of your way.”

  “That is usually for the best.”

  She went to the hangar and looked at the shuttle that was squatting in place. Of course. The king’s shuttle. It hadn’t been used in years, and she was going to break a dozen taboos by taking it out. But it was going to fly again.

  Solari went to the first shuttle and used the systems to ping the satellite near the gate. She got a response that made her groan. Of course. He ran to his grandmother’s house.

  She went to the mechanic. “Can any of these newer ships be prepped within a day?”

  “No, miss. They are all three- to four-day repairs.”

  “Of course, they are. Right, I am going to get the pilot hauler. Don’t get in my way.”

  The mechanic held his hands up, and he nodded. “I will stay right here.”

  “Wait, why is it just you? Aren’t there usually six techs on duty?”

  “Yes, miss. The prince gave the rest the week off. I was on call.”

  “Of course, he did.” She stalked away from the mechanic before she screamed epithets in five languages.

  The pilot rig backed into the hangar easily, and she hooked the link into the rig’s extension. Being careful, she drove the shuttle out and into the sunlight. When it was out on the tarmac, she released the tow and put the pilot rig back. Now it was time for the serious stuff—oxygen, food, and making sure that the damned thing would fire up.

  She had to lay in the essentials for hunting a missing prince. It was her duty to bring him home. She hated the word duty.

  Chapter Two

  Flying a shuttle was not on her list of favourite things to do. Those would be runs through the woods, hot baths, and comfortable clothing. Oh, and kicking Hazwell’s ass, but she hadn’t been able to reach it.

  She lifted off and took the coordinates to the gate. The space station filled with illegal activities was only a few hours away if she could get into the gate quickly. The longer she waited, the further the gate would drift from her target. It had been hours since the prince had escaped, so she was at a distinct disadvantage. Time and hair clogs in her drain were her enemy.

  Some folks thought space was romantic, but she would rather take herself through a den of vipers than fly through the pile of nothing. This was really stressing her out.

  Solari waited for the ancient computer to lock into the coordinates and communicate with the gate. As she waited, she looked around. It wasn’t precisely ancient, but the other ships had regular upgrades. This vessel hadn’t been flown in ten years. It did not instill confidence.

  The gate sent the signal for her destination, and she throttled forward as fast as the shuttle could manage. When the shuttle reached top speed, she sent the signal to the gate for activation.

  Staring into the void between dimensions was enough to make her want to close her eyes, but as the pilot, she didn’t have that option, and it really wasn’t recommended.

  The stars blurred around her, and the shuttle was locked in the gate. The ride was now out of her control.

  She scrubbed her face with her hands and watched the countdown to normal space. She had an hour.

  “What kind of a jackass takes off when he has just been told he is going to get married?” She bolted out of the pilot’s chair and went to scrub her face. It was cruel of the queen to send her on this mission when so many of the other wolves would have gladly hunted Hazwell and torn him to pieces before dragging him home.

  She blotted at her skin and felt her wolf trying to rise. Her tattoo held it down, and she let herself cry. She was trapped in her own nightmare, and she wasn’t going to wake up any time soon. She had been trying for a decade.

  The counter ticked down, and Solari braced to be spit out. The shuttle jolted and skewed sideways as she exited the gate. “Shit!”

  The alerts inside the shuttle told her that she had been caught in a net. Of course, those crimson idiots would have been on alert to a gate from their home.

  She ran diagnostics on the vessel and cursed. The queen had finally managed to do it. She had sent her on a mission that was going to end in her certain death. Soon.

  Right. To business. She had to figure out a way to the station with a broken ship.

  Solari identified that the right navigational thrusters were toast, so she watched the spin that she had been sent into and triggered the left thrusters in one-second bursts. It took an hour of work to get her within calling distance of the station, and that is when she found out that she had no long-range coms.

  She took in a deep breath and kept her eyes on the station, firing the left thruster as she incrementally got closer and closer to the station. She would probably run out of fuel before she got close enough to be a threat to the station and, therefore, either blown up or rescued.

  “What a fantastic day.”

  * * * *

  Hazwell sat with his grandmother, having tea. He poured for her, and she smiled up at him.

  “You are such a nice boy. Why aren’t you giving me great-grandbabies yet?” His grandmother smiled and leaned back with the cup of tea.

  Hazwell leaned in his own chair and said, “They don’t come from me. We have had this discussion before.”

  “I don’t care about legitimacy.”

  “I do.” He growled. “This idea of my mother’s is insane.”

  His grandmother cackled. “That is my daughter you are insulting. Rightfully so, but still, speak with respect.”

  He growled. “Fine, she is royally insane.”

  Hydu-Nuan was queen of the station, and all of the worlds within the grasp of it were hers. Her daughter had met a king, become queen, and then taken over his world. If it wasn’t for the necessity of the gate, Hydu-Nuan would have claimed her daughter’s world as well.

  “Better. Where are these wolves that were going to come after you? It has been days.”

  He frowned. “I don’t know. I honestly expected that they would be here by now.”

  “The arena will only remain reserved for another few days.” His grandmother muttered the words an instant before the door opened, and one
of her secretaries came in. The man was of an unidentifiable race, but the muscled seven feet of him certainly made an impression.

  He walked up to Hydu-Nuan, and he whispered quickly to her.

  Hazwell’s grandmother sat up. “Send retrievers and a med team.”

  The secretary bowed and headed out, speaking into his headset. There was urgency in his voice, and Hazwell sat straight. “What is going on?”

  “Someone set a net near the gate, and it caught a shuttle coming out. It has been limping toward the station for three days. Life signs are visible but minimal. Whatever is in that ship is going to be dead in a few hours if we don’t catch them and bring them in.” She chuckled. “More tea?”

  “Do you have an image of the ship?” Hazwell leaned forward.

  She sighed and grabbed one of her projectors. She slid it in the center of the table and dimmed the lights. “Display incoming ship.”

  Hazwell looked at the tiny black speck that was nearly invisible and said, “Magnify.”

  The ship got larger, and he could make out the gold streaks of the royal insignia. “Magnify.”

  The right side of the ship was torn to hell. It looked like it had run through some heavy rocks. The glow of the power cells showed exactly how close the ship had come to exploding. “That is my father’s vessel. I thought they tore it down for scrap.”

  “Well, it’s trash now. Huh, look at it spin.”

  The slow rotation was hypnotic, but it was definitely coming toward the station.

  There was only one of the wolves crazy enough to fly out in a seventy-year-old shuttle that hadn’t been flown in a decade. “Solari.”

  His grandmother perked up. “Little Solari? The Little Wolf? That is who my daughter sent after you?”

  She started laughing. “Oh, this is going to be fun to watch. She was so cute when she was twelve. I haven’t seen her since.”